


really didn't need to fall in love

by embraidery



Series: Cyrano & Co at Uni [1]
Category: Cyrano de Bergerac - Edmond Rostand
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Crush at First Sight, F/F, Friendship, M/M, Puns & Word Play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-16 15:17:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13056645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/embraidery/pseuds/embraidery
Summary: Cyrano meets Roxane for the first time. To take her mind off her instant crush, she hangs out with Le Bret.(Would be G but she uses some rude slang)





	really didn't need to fall in love

Cyrano firmly believes that the concept of love at first sight is false, and probably harmful to boot. (She knows that she’s enough of a cynic for the entire fencing team.) But when she claps eyes on Roxane, she’s prepared to eat crow for the rest of her life.

She’s in her dorm room when an unknown voice behind her calls out a cheery hello. When she turns around, it feels as though she’s been slapped in the face with rainbows and sunshine. She’s fully aware how cheesy that sounds, but god, she can’t help it. The newcomer’s dark cheeks and nose are rosy from the autumn air, and the wind has blown strands of long dark hair around her face. She’s already smiling in greeting. It looks as though the sun has come out from behind the clouds. 

Cyrano takes herself firmly in hand and stands up, praying that her wonder doesn’t show in her expression. ‘Cyrano,’ she says, holding out a hand. ‘It’s a pleasure.’ 

‘Oh, don’t be silly!’ says the girl, throwing her arms around Cyrano. ‘I’m Roxane. It’s wonderful to meet you!’ Cyrano breathes in incense, flowery shampoo, musky perfume, and a mouthful of hair. Roxane’s grip is soft and surprisingly strong, but by the time Cyrano has come to her senses enough to tighten her own grip, Roxane has let go of her. She picks up her purple suitcases and deposits them on the bed. Cyrano thinks to herself that Roxane neither stared at nor ignored Cyrano’s nose.

‘Hey, are you okay?’ Roxane asks, seeing that Cyrano hasn’t moved from in front of her desk. She flashes another smile. ‘Would you mind helping me with the rest of my bags?’

Cyrano shakes herself. ‘Yes, absolutely, where?’

Roxane laughs and waves out the hallway of their dorm room. ‘Down in the car.’ The whole way down to her father’s car, Roxane chatters to Cyrano about the long drive and how she already misses her pets. She’s still going when they come back up to their room. She finishes a story about her newest cat as they dump the last suitcase onto her bed. She grins and stands in the doorway, hands on hips, looking at the room. ‘It doesn’t look like much now, but it’s going to look great very soon!’ She’s about to open one of her bags when her phone dings.

‘I’ve got a trivia night in fifteen minutes, wanna come?’

Cyrano shrugs and nods, game for anything this goddess would suggest. ‘Lead the way.’ She has to stop herself from tacking on an elegant ‘my lady.’ She thinks it comes from reading too many classic novels. 

The café is within walking distance, but that would be cutting it close, so they catch a bus from outside their dorm. Their knees brush and bump together between the narrow cushioned seats. Cyrano leans in to point out her favorite restaurants as they flash by. Roxane sticks out her tongue as she writes down each name in a little notebook pulled from her satchel. All too soon, the bus jerks to a stop, and Roxane and Cyrano dash from the warmth of the bus through the chilly air of the street into the warmth of Ragueneau’s Café. The café is a popular choice with Cyrano and the artsier students at Bourgogne U. The owner, the eponymous Ragueneau, is a friendly older man who loves poetry. Cyrano reads the stanza copied onto the blackboard by the menu. 

Poetry fills me with joy / and I rise like a feather in the wind.  
Poetry fills me with sorrow / and I sink like a chain flung from a bridge.

Cyrano smiles to herself and waves to Ragueneau as they pass. He waves back and begins to brew Cyrano’s usual flavor of tea. There’s a flurry of hugs and hellos as Roxane and Cyrano join a group of fresh-faced students in the corner. Cyrano can feel eyes on her nose. She flashes a fake smile and slips away. As soon as she enters the cramped little restroom, she takes a deep breath and digs her fingers into her hair. Normally a gathering like this would be nothing; she can command a room if she wants to. Meeting Roxane has thrown her momentarily off balance. Cyrano splashes some cold water on her face and pats it dry. She tightens her ponytail and throws her shoulders back, chin in the air. She stares down her nose until she has to snap her gaze away.

‘Here goes nothing,’ she says to herself, and steps back into the main room of the café.

‘Just in time!’ Roxane says, waving to the spot next to her, and Cyrano slips into the chair. Ragueneau brings her her mug of tea. 

‘Welcome!’ says the trivia master. After a brief introduction to the rules, they begin the list of questions. ‘Let’s start off nice and easy. What is the name of the musician that performed the visual album Lemonade?’ 

‘Beyoncé,’ everyone at the table whispers to each other, and Roxane writes it down in a barely-legible scrawl. Cyrano notices and jogs Roxane with her elbow, pointing to the mess. Roxane pretends to look away in shame and passes Cyrano the sheet. Cyrano rewrites Beyoncé in her passable cursive.

Cyrano feels more and more in her element as the night goes on. She begins to crack jokes and make puns when she can. The questions range over topics from art to science to sports to politics and back again, with hardly any Cyrano can’t answer. She’s surprised to discover that Roxane is even better at trivia than she is. They grin and high-five each other for each simultaneous answer. 

No one is surprised when their team, Trivial Fursuit, is declared the unequivocal winner. Roxane punches the air in triumph and gives Cyrano a hug. Cyrano loses her footing again when faced with Roxane’s tight embrace. 

‘Well, I think I’m off,’ says Roxane, slinging her satchel over her shoulder. ‘I’m going to spend the night with a friend, so I’ll see you tomorrow?’ She smiles at Cyrano and wraps her in another hug. Cyrano hopes that she’ll always be this cuddly. 

‘Yeah, yeah, absolutely,’ she says, and Roxane smiles and disappears into the post-trivia crowd. Cyrano stares after her. She pulls out her phone to text Le Bret. Cyrano spends the bus ride to his place staring out the window, chin propped in one hand. She almost misses the stop and has to scramble out of the bus. She walks into Le Bret’s without knocking, kicking off her shoes and grabbing the pair of slippers kept in the closet for her. She greets Le Bret’s mom and walks through to the family room, where Le Bret is playing Legend of Zelda. 

‘Hey,’ he says. ‘I’d look up, but I’d die.’

‘I see how it is, you don’t care about me,’ says Cyrano, grabbing a soda out of the mini fridge and curling up on the couch by Le Bret. She pulls the blanket up around her lap. ‘I’m positively stabbed through the heart, Bret.’

‘Did you know,’ Bret says slowly, navigating through a tight spot, ‘that you don’t have to be a fencer 24/7?’ 

‘Psh, that’s not me being a fencer. Have you ever seen me get stabbed through the heart on the piste?’

‘I’m sure I’ve personally scored a touch on your chest, Cyrano.’ 

‘You would attack a lady on her chest, Bret? How heart-less of you,’ she says.

‘Not your best work,’ says Bret, finishing the level and setting down the controller. 

‘I just got back from trivia and I’m exhausted. Surely the fact that my puns aren’t up to standard is trivial.’

Bret groans and smacks her shoulder. ‘Really?’ He looks over at her for the first time. ‘You’re in a good mood.’ He offers her the controller and gets up to get a snack.

She sets her soda down by the couch and attempts the level, dying almost right away. ‘Who, me? I’m always like this.’

Bret raises his eyebrows but lets it slide. He leans on the back of the couch and meditatively eats jerky as he watches her struggle. ‘Since when have you been this bad at Zelda?’

‘I told you, trivia took it out of me.’ Her character dies and she tilts her head back to look at him. He intently returns her gaze. ‘Can I stay tonight?’

‘Do you need to ask?’ Bret rejoins her on the couch and pulls another controller from the box under the couch.

‘I’m a girl with principles.’ 

‘How long have we known each other now?’ 

Cyrano narrows her eyes as she wracks her brain for a poem about childhood. Coming up empty, she improvises, ‘Ah, we were but babes in arms when we made each other’s acquaintance...our love helped us grow strong and tall...’ 

Bret wrinkles his nose. ‘You really are tired. You can just go to bed if you like. Stay as long as you want, but I’ve got a pancake breakfast with Paul at 10 AM.’

‘Gross. What is this, a rom-com?’ 

‘You’re just jealous, you bitter old lady.’

‘Jealous of having to answer to someone else? No thanks, I’m no one’s but my own.’ 

Bret pauses the level and turns to her, holding her gaze. ‘Listen, Cyrano, love isn’t that. It’s a partnership, not a dictatorship.’

‘A dick-tatorship, in your case?’ Cyrano suggests, breaking their gaze and taking a sip of soda.

‘Ha. Really, Cyrano. Love is...’ Bret struggles to find words.

‘You can leave the philosophy to me, Bret,’ Cyrano smirks, shoving his shoulder. ‘Anyway, haven’t you only been seeing Paul for a month?’ Cyrano unpauses the level and focuses on the task ahead of them, but not without seeing Bret cover his face with his hands.

‘Well, yes. But I really like him!’ 

‘I’m happy for you,’ Cyrano says automatically. ‘But shh, you’re dick-tracting from the game.’

‘That’s your second dick pun tonight, Cee.’

‘Shut up.’

They bicker for half an hour more before getting ready for bed. Cyrano has a precise bedtime schedule. She unties her hair and lets it fall, red waves brushing her freckled shoulders. She runs her fingers through it, tucking it behind her ears, before she savors the feeling of running makeup wipes over her eyelids and lips. Then she pops her estrogen and anti-androgen pills, throwing them down her throat without water. She brushes her teeth and retrieves her old MIKA shirt and a pair of flannel bottoms from her drawer in Bret’s wardrobe. By the time she’s ready for bed, Bret is already sitting up in bed, reading glasses on, reading Game of Thrones. 

‘Hey, Grandpa, have you seen my friend Le Bret anywhere? He’s about yay tall, good complexion, cares too much about university?” she asks, snuggling under the covers and intentionally pressing her cold feet to Bret’s legs. He yelps and jerks them away from her. 

‘Says the girl that loves Oscar Wilde,’ returns Bret, setting the book and his glasses on the bedside table. ‘Keep your cold feet away from me.’

Cyrano reaches out and pokes him with a cold toe. ‘You’re such a killjoy.’ But she keeps to her side of the bed. She stretches and stares up at the glow-in-the-dark stars they put on the ceiling in fifth grade. She wonders if Roxane ever had glow-in-the-dark stars. Probably her own smile would provide all the light she’d need at night. God, what a sap she’s turned into. 

‘I’ll gladly be the killjoy in this friendship. Goodnight, Cyrano,’ Bret says, turning out the light.

‘Night, Bret.’

**Author's Note:**

> This was one of the first things I wrote for Cyrano de Bergerac and I'm not quite happy with my characterisation of Cyrano and Le Bret, but I think it's a fun little fluff piece anyway. This is part of my modern university AU in which Cyrano and Roxane didn't meet until they became roommates, but Cyrano and Le Bret have been best friends since forever. I take a few liberties in how close Cyrano and Le Bret would probably be, but whatever, it's just for fun!
> 
> The excerpt from a poem copied onto Ragueneau's blackboard is by Billy Collins.
> 
> Tip: don't swallow pills dry like Cyrano.


End file.
